Looking at the sky on Friday, I wish I could be those kites flying high in the sky…
If I am a kite, your courage and help is the contrary wind raise it higher, but no matter how high I will fly, in the end, I will still come back, I know you hold the string, using not only hands, but with all of your love in heart.

New meme! Weekend Reflections hosted by James. James blog is the place I like to visit, but only discover this meme this week. I like his Newtown area photos. Well this is a photo captured one day after rain, I was on the way back home, after a heavy afternoon rain, the sun come out again, shine on the road, I stopped my car to take this photo.

I am thinking of writing a post about “old age” for this week ABC WEDNESDAY ROUND 5: O, since there are a lot of issues about old age people, old age life in Singapore here. I have been thinking quiet sometime about my old age time too, though it is still a long way to go. :) But I am unable to write this, my old friend came to Singapore this morning, he went to Maldives for a short holiday and stop by Singapore for a few days. Well, I am the host here, and should bring him around.
So this post just a simple note about “Old friend”.
An old friend, who loves me and teach me to dream and to laugh; An old friend, who is always beside me when the rest of the world step out from my life; An old friend, who accept me as who I was, who I am and who I will be.

An old friend, he is the moon light in the darkness, guide me along walk out from the juggle.

I am always chasing the dream,
the elusive dream.
Just like I am always chasing the shadow,
the elusive shadow in the rainforest.
The shadow is something ineffable,
you will feel it but you never ever can catch it.
Who can ever catch the shadow in the rainforest?
The elusive shadow,
it exits but then escapes,
It is within reach but not within grasp.
My love in my elusive dream,
it is a pretty shadow when sun shines on it,
but I never ever can catch it.
it is easier to just let go,
or appreciate the beauty from far when it exits.
Chasing my elusive dream,
that seem like keeping the shadow in the darkness,
Tired of knowing the impossibility,
wondering the shadow where they belong.
Trying so hard to keep my dreams alive,
lost in the juggle ,
I am not the big tree,
either the lianas,
I am fighting so hard to survive.
Chasing the shadow of my love,
they are always coming closer and closer,
but never I can hold them in hand,
not even in my elusive dream.
Feeling the pain and trying to make sense,
where the shadow should go,
I lost in the promise I have never believed,
Struggling to make my elusive dream alive.

Today, most of the shell Petrol Stations (excluding four of them never join the promotion) in Singapore are having a promotion, Celebrate the launch of new Shell FuelSave 98 and 95 at just $1 (nett) per litre, promotion stared from 10AM and will end at 6pm only for today, it caused heavy traffic jam anywhere near the shell stations. The CISCO have been activated for crowd control. Some drivers did horn non-stop while queuing for petrol promotion, some drivers were jumping into the queue, some were quarreling because of small matters during the queue…Again, the shell management are fancy showcasing the ugliest side of ourselves after the previous promotion on our national day!

The queue was just crazy! It ran more than 1 km outside the Shell Petrol Stations at many places. I was told by a lot of people they spent an hour queue for pumping the cheapest petrol. Ya, crazy queue indeed …I don’t know how much they can save, maybe $30, I bet for the max, but how about the time, an hour! Save money but waste the time and the petro while queuing, how much can you save? What is the purpose of saving? In the end only Shell is the winner, will be on the headline on the media.

I never joined the queue, for me the best way of saving money is to take public transport when I am not in a hurry. I always try not driving on weekend when I am not rushing between office and home. I try to take a walk for some short distance. Isn’t it the easy way to save money and save our environment instead of queuing for an hour to pump petrol.

The previous shell Petrol Stations promotion on National Day caused a lot of traffic problems too. I just don’t understand those who can afford a car worth tens of thousands of dollars, eat out one time can easily spend more than $50 for a small family, buying one TOTO spending more than $50, but yet they are scramble like ugly beggars for the small discount, are these our lovely typical Singaporeans?

A sunny day, I am looking at the sky from my window, still don’t feel like going back to office today, a hard working person like me seldom take any off day from work, I don’t know what to do at home except making some day dreams…And it is so so so good when I still can have some day dreams while struggling with work-life balance, stress, marriage and kid.

I like to see the big trees in the rainforest, some big trees reach up to forty meters, widely spaced and very tall, they have been living there for many many years, they must have a strong and competitive race to get to the sun for the leaves. I like to see the leaves in the rainforest, the leaves are quite waxy with drip tips to protect the trees from heavy rain, all the leaves are the beauty of nature, they are telling us the stories in the rainforest. The most interesting are those lianas, they climb across those big trees to get more sunlight, some hang down from the trees to the ground to get water, they make the vegetation more dense, but yet they are many many plants like fern type get to survive with few sunlight. That is life in nature, quite struggling if you ask me! Same as in our office, every working place is just like some kinds of rainforest, isn’t it?

Bukit Timah hill is the highest hill in Singapore, with an official height of 164 meters or 538 feet this is the highest point in the country. It is located in the centre-west of Singapore, a very good place for tracking and enjoy the nature. I went there for a walk last Friday. It was so relaxing to look at the sky through the trees.

I took about 45 minutes to walk around in this ancient forest and I didn’t have enough time to explore some interesting facts in nature, I am sure I will go there again. Here are some photos were taken in Bukit Timah Nature Reserve.

You can find quite a lot of long-tailed macaque (Macaca fascicularis) in Bukit Timah Nature Reserve. They are often seen jumping from car to car in the car park, resting on the roof top of the office building, or swinging from the tree to tree.

One of the enjoyable things to walk in the forest is the pleasant and tranquil feeling. The only sounds we hear were cicadas chirping away and some other insects buzzing away.

The sounds of nature are the most beautiful music for you to enjoy in the quiet forest. I was trying to look for cicada but couldn’t get to see any one. The Bukit Timah Nature Reserve is a typical tropical rainforest, you can find a lot of interesting trees here. The tropical rainforest is similar to the human world in some aspects. Those capable of getting the sunlight would grow up tall and strong. Whichever that can't get the enough sunlight, would be growing at the bottom as a shorter tree or a shrub.

Some trees like those people in the office, step on other people’s shoulder to climb to the top, take other people’s hard work as their own credit. They are like Lianas in the rainforest. Lianas are woody climbers. Climbing from tree to tree, growing up to the top to get more sunlight.

Lianas in the rainforest, the meaning of life is to survive, to grow up to the sky, to achieve the sunlight as much as it can, to conquer the world in the rainforest. These small green plants are survivors or conquerors? Find more poems at One Single Impression "Conquer" as prompt was suggested by Neha Sahi Saigal ofTea Leaves 'n' Honey

The three long-tailed Macaque gave me a lot of fun this weekend. I guess they are father, mother, and of course, behind the little one is baby long-tailed Macaque. Six words Saturday is a very interesting meme. All that's necessary to participate is to post your own six words, add a linkto the blog hosted by Cate and visit all other participations. This week I would like to share with you this photo of lovely long-tailed Macaque. I were so close to them when the photo was taken. Well, I will tell you where I took this photo and some more other interesting photos will be posted next week.

What is the baby long-tailed Macaque looking for?

Camera Critters, this meme is all about photos of animals/critters. Hope you like these three lovely long-tailed Macaque and visit Camera Critters for more fun.

Turtles are always my favorites in front of my camera. Here are some other turtles were resting in the middle of the pond. Watery Wednesday here, visit the site for more images related to WATER. My other turtles are here, here, here and here.

If she is not my mother-in-law, just a neighbor, I believe we will be easier to get along well. She is not a bad person anyway, just a bit selfish, and very old traditional Chinese. I am not a bad person either, but for sure I am not that type of “Good daughter-in-law” as she wanted.

Staying together with Mother-in-law is really a very very tough life. I have gone through that tough time. We stayed together with Mother-in-law and a few of other sisters-in-law. My husband was in a poor situation as he needed to take care of so many people’s feeling, and there is no way to make every one happy, especially in a big family, as I came from totally different education and life style background. Come to the points of talking about every day’s life, our very personal habits, our life style, our religion etc, actually there are no right or wrong, just like between black and white area, there are a part of grey. Every one who stays under the same roof must learn to give in to each other and respect to each other, but not just the outsider, me, as a daughter-in-law must follow their rules. Anyway nowadays is unlike traditional society, as a wife, while juggling my career, work, housework, husband, I don’t think I have extra strength to deal with the complicated relationship. Ya, so I have gone through the tough time for the first two years in our marriage, and the shadow of those unhappy things did effect our marriage, more or less. But thanks God, our marriage survive till now. Of course, we are not staying together any more.

It is very difficult to say I don’t want to stay with Mother-in-law. I feel totally heartless but if I agree to live altogether, I don't think we can be truly happy. It is really a very very hard decision, to both my husband and me. But for me, I feel that is the most important decision you must make once you step into marriage life. I have seen so many unhappy marriage are caused by in-law’s problems, just recently last year, the Chinese lady killed the brother-in-law, I always think why they must stay together, why three family must stay together in such a big house since they don’t get along well with each other, if they could stay on their own, the lady wouldn’t get mad to kill the brother-in-law, then, the old lady won’t lost the son, the few young kids won’t lost the father and mother, the man won’t lost the wife, the wife won’t lost the husband. Things will be different if they could make an early decision to stay on each other own, lead a more western style life.

Marriage is not the matter just between two persons. It connects two unfamiliar clans together. After getting married, you will have a deep understanding of it. Especially being a Chinese, or you are going to married to a Chinese, especially Chinese Singaporean. You must know that the relationship between mother and daughter in law is the hardest thing to deal with. The war between them frequently happens. Usually, the man is the victim of the war between his mother and his wife. Just think about it: Is it easy to let two women (worst a few women, with all sisters-in-law) who do not have blood relationship live together peacefully through their lives?

But there is some exception, my mother is a good example. She stays with my brother and the wife, they are happily living together for 8 years already. Some of my mother’s rules are as below:

Daughter-in-law has her own habits in daily life, if you think is a bad habit, don’t say out, don’t be so nagging. You can’t change a person over the night. Just close one eye.

Don’t step into the quarrel between husband and wife, don’t be bored.

Your son is no long the little boy who asked your help of everything. Don’t except or request the wife to replace your position to do for him for those things you used to do. Don’t act too clever to teach your daughter-in-law how to take care of husband. If she really wants to learn something from you she will ask.

Don’t always compare your own old times with her, don’t say such words: “I used to take care of six children without a maid…” etc. No one likes to listen to same story days by days.

Don’t bother the way your daughter-in-law spending money, that is her own money or her husband money, as long as she never borrow money from you.

Give the husband and wife more private space.

My mum has a lot of good ideas to be a happy mother-in-law, a smart mother-in-law, so she is very welcomed in her son’s house. Actually not all the mothers-in-law are so difficult to deal with and not all the daughters-in-law are so heartless to want to kick off the older parents. It is a lesson both mother-in-law and daughter-in-law must learn in our life time. Too bad we always can’t find a good lecturer.

Come to the end of the post, I want to ask you:

What is your understanding of mother- and daughter in law relationship? Do you have problems in dealing with it? Any effective ways to build a peaceful and friendly mother-and daughter in law relationship?

I was told that the relationship with mother in law in western country is much easier than in Chinese culture. Is that true?

I wish to hear your opinions. Do remember to visit ABC Wednesday, this is a lovely Meme, check out all other posts here.